New telephony systems are being developed in which equipment for the system is distributed throughout the network rather than being at one central location. As an example, Hybrid Fiber Coax (HFC) networks can support telephony services and typically do so through the deployment of equipment at or near the subscriber site. The HFC network equipment that is deployed at or near the home, often referred to as a “communications gateway”, allows telephone service to be provided over the cable TV network, where the communications gateway interacts with a traditional telephone line at the home to provide conventional telecommunications service. In particular, the communications gateway converts the telephone signals originating in the home to a cable compatible signal which is then transported across the cable network and into a traditional circuit switched or Internet telephony based telephone network. In the development of these cable based telephony systems, it is clear that voice prompt technology will be used to support services including voicemail, telephony services configuration, and a host of other features.
As is well-known in the art, voice prompts are frequently used to allow a user to interact with a telephone-based system, including voicemail systems, ordering systems, billing systems and a number of other financial, service based, or informational services. The voicemail prompts are typically coupled with menu systems which allow the user to navigate through the service and select options, retrieve information, and place orders. Responses to the menus are entered using the telephone keypad or are received through a voice recognition system.
The use of voice prompts has allowed a multitude of interactive telephone services to be provided to consumers. Voice prompts can also be utilized to allow a user to configure services and equipment. As an example, voice mailbox features including outgoing messages can be configured using voice prompts and configuration menus.
In the HFC network environment, voice prompt technology will allow the communications gateway to be controlled by the user and provide a number of services including voicemail. The telephone can be used as the basic input device, and users will use the telephone keypad to, among other things, access menus and program the communications gateway. Use of voice prompt technology removes the need for a display on the telephone to permit interactivity with the user. Nevertheless, voice prompt technology will require the use of voice prompt files which will play menus, options and provide configuration information to the user.
Distributed telecommunications systems allow many functions to be offloaded from centralized equipment (e.g. servers) to client side devices. For prompt technology, this allows voice and text prompt files to be stored at the subscriber side, rather than at the server side. This requires that the appropriate prompt files be delivered to the client side equipment. In addition to the problem of locating the appropriate files, difficulties can arise with respect to insuring that the files are updated. For this reason, a method and apparatus of providing locally generated voice prompts from a central source is required. This method should support retrieval and updating of files located on communications gateways which provide telecommunications services over HFC plants.